Satellite Photos Show Cleansing of Syrian Site

[spanone]

<snip>New commercial satellite photos show that a Syrian site believed to have been attacked by Israel last month no longer bears any obvious traces of what some analysts said appeared to have been a partly built nuclear reactor.

Two photos, taken Wednesday from space by rival companies, show the site near the Euphrates River to have been wiped clean since August, when imagery showed a tall square building there measuring about 150 feet on a side.

The Syrians reported an attack by Israel in early September; the Israelis have not confirmed that. Senior Syrian officials continue to deny that a nuclear reactor was under construction, insisting that Israel hit a largely empty military warehouse.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/26/world/middleeast/26weapons.html?hp=&pagewanted=print

[Kajsa]

1. It's gone, finito.

What DOES the Israeli government say?

[Warpy]

2. "Oops?"

It's a funny looking reactor, no pond or cooling tower, no obvious water source anywhere.

It reminds me of those big buildings with trucks outside that Powell insisted were nerve gas factories with bioweapons trucks at the ready.

It could have been a Wal Mart distributor in Dubuque.

[spanone]

3. you're right, it was a wal-mart with terrorists shopping for weapons

[Zywiec]

4. The site is near the Euphrates River

but since it was just an empty building, apparently nothing was damaged.

[Warpy]

12. It would have to be on the Euphrates

or have a very large canal dug to the Euphrates.

[bananas]

19. It is on the Euphrates - the water source is clearly visible in the satellite photo

The image in the OP is cropped to show just that building.
This isn't government propaganda, it's an independant arms control group that looked at satellite photos to see if they could figure out what Israel bombed.
This fits the description.
It's not conclusive - but it fits the description.
They have two pdf reports on their website with the images.

http://www.isis-online.org/

ISIS Imagery Brief: http://www.isis-online.org/publications/SyriaUpdate25October2007.pdf
Syria Update: Suspect Reactor Site Dismantled
by David Albright, Paul Brannan, and Jacqueline Shire
October 25, 2007

ISIS Imagery Brief: http://www.isis-online.org/publications/SuspectSite_24October2007.pdf
Suspect Reactor Construction Site in Eastern Syria: The Site of the September 6 Israeli Raid?
by David Albright and Paul Brannan
October 24, 2007

[LSK]

10. I was just thinking that reactors need a water source...

[endarkenment]

5. Why should I believe any of this?

And as a follow up question, why is Israel allowed to commit acts of war with impunity?

[alcibiades_mystery]

7. Answers

1) You shouldn't.

2) Never ask such anti-semitic questions.

That is all.

[Bucky]

9. I'm as wary of Israeli militarism as the next person, but...

I wouldn't assume anything the Baathists in Syria are doing adds up to no good. I get more upset about Israel because when they're bastards, they're OUR bastards. But that doesn't make the Syrians not bastards.

[endarkenment]

14. ah, hmmm.. Syria mostly a bastard to Syrians

and to Lebanese, but then again they more or less consider Lebanon to be a part of Syria that was stolen from them by the French, and they have a point. But the main point is that Syria is not flying around blowing up buildings in foreign countries on speculation, while Israel and the United States are doing just that. We are the aggressor nations in this mess of a world these days. We seem to have become the bad guys and we also seem to be having trouble dealing with that.

[alcibiades_mystery]

6. "what some analysts said appeared to have been..."

Og fer fuck's sake. What some carping warmongers and propagandists won't even go on record to lie about, it being such an absurd proposition.

Here's what happened. let's go over it slow: The Israelis bombed an outhouse. Then, a bunch of well-paid douchebag Israeli and aligned warmonger "experts" come out and say it "may have appeared to have possibly been a greenish-yellow nuclear monster fish." The press and idiots all over the world (including on this site)lap it up, despite utter lack of anything even resembling concrete proof. And voila, the genius Israelis have stopped the Syrian menace from getting nuclear monster-fishing and sicing them on Haifa, which they would do the second they had the capacity, doncha know.

How fucking stupid are people? How fucking stupid are Americans? How fucking dumb is the American press, and the New York Times? And how fucking dumb do they think WE are?

[Zywiec]

8. Yeah, they were wrong about Osirak also.

Why they would risk so much to bomb completely useless facilities is beyond me.

[LSK]

11. what risk?

[spanone]

13. probably a practice run....getting ready for the real target....tehran?

[Bucky]

15. That's a bit of baloney

Israel had good reason to think Osirik was a future source of weapons grade nuclear material. The Wiki article on this is pretty useful. The idea that they'd cause an international incident over a "practice run" is absurd. Even the US government condemned the Osirik attack. It was a huge risk. Israel & Iran have always played it pretty cagy with one another. They talk like they hate each other all the time, but their intelligence agencies frequently cooperate (Iran-Contra for example) because they share so many enemies. Until the recent insane crew under Netanyahu started elbowing into power, Iran has always been the last fundy Muslim country Israel would want to attack.

[spanone]

21. we'll see.

[Zywiec]

16. How about being shot down? n/t

[LSK]

17. yes thats risky for the pilots but the country???

[alcibiades_mystery]

18. I didn't say they were wrong

I said they were deliberately and maliciously making it up, which is to say, fucking lying.

Risk what? Who's gonna call them on it?

You?

[Kajsa]

20. Does anyone outside of the Syrian government

really know what's going on in Syria?

There's lots of speculation, but the facts are hard
to come by.

[TripleD]

22. Shouldn't there be satellite photos....

...after the supposed bombing but before they cleaned it up?

You'd think that those would be more damning than a bulldozed pile of dirt.


Unless, of course, they show something easily discernible as something other than a nuke plant.

[Junkdrawer]

23. If you adjust the contrast and the brightness of the two pictures...

to match each other, there is less "cleansing" than at first blush.